U.S. application Ser. No. 08/190,131, filed Feb. 3, 1994, issued as U.S. Pat. No. 5,515,606 Albeck et al., discloses a method and apparatus for automatic wiring of terminals of electrical apparatus or components. Terminals and connection clamping elements are used which have a slit-blade insulation piercing (SBIP) connector, particularly adapted for automatic wiring, to form one connection terminal. The electric line, laid by a line laying tool under programmed control along a predetermined line laying path, is automatically pressed into the insulation piercing slit, creating an electrical contact; the line is then optionally cut off directly next to the terminal contact point. The connecting line of the electrical device, such as a capacitor, a lamp socket, or a fluorescent lamp ballast is connected in a manner not shown in further detail and known per se to the electric contact means, containing the insulation piercing slit, which are located in the interior of a housing of insulating material securely protected against being touched. In the embodiment as a coupling connector, the connector device has two spatially separate connection points in the form of SBIP connectors, which are conductively connected to one another by contact means located in the interior of the insulating material housing of the connector. Both SBIP connectors are arranged for automatic wiring, and provisions are made so that the conductor ends, cut off on the two SBIP connectors, are protected in the connector in a manner secure against being touched.
An electric terminal connector device described in European Patent Disclosure EP 0 573 792 A1, corresponding to U.S. Ser. No. 08/190,129, filed Feb. 3, 1994, Albeck et al., is provided with connection points embodied as above. The arrangement may be chosen to be such that the terminal connector device is part of a terminal element that is arranged directly to hold electrical operating means, for instance in that the terminal connector devices are formed onto or otherwise secured to a lamp socket or a base part arranged for the connection of a capacitor.
These terminal connector devices have proven to be excellent in practice. At their SBIP connectors, they assure perfect gas-tight contacting of the electrical conductors for the internal wiring of the wired device, such as an electric light for gas discharge lamps. As long as these devices are produced in sufficiently large-scale mass production with fundamentally the identical design, there are no difficulties involved in designing the terminal connector devices for the particular intended purposes and function and to produce them oneself. Increasingly, however, there is a demand for these terminal or coupling connectors that are suitable for automatic wiring and that make it possible to create different connection possibilities as needed with relatively few individual parts, in order to meet the requirements of an individual situation. With electric lights, for instance, the internal wiring should be done automatically by the SBIP technique, while the connection of the light to the external supply lines of the line power grid should be done via screw connections or screwless terminal contacts, of the kind that have been conventional until now for connecting lights. A further factor is that the internal wiring makes do with electrical conductors to smaller cross section, while the power grid supply lines have the larger line cross sections typical of interior building wiring.